


Heavy Boots of Lead

by Stoneheart



Category: Teppuu (Manga)
Genre: Backstory, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Implied/Referenced Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-03
Updated: 2014-02-03
Packaged: 2018-01-11 01:12:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1166832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stoneheart/pseuds/Stoneheart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"There was a time, back in the day, when I used to look up to Sanae. When we were kids..."<br/>- Natsuo, Teppuu Chapter 22</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heavy Boots of Lead

**Author's Note:**

> A quick little thing written for Femslash February on tumblr. I really believe something like this is what's going on between these two, even if I'm sure the canon will present it all a lot more subtly.
> 
> You probably want to have read through chapter 22 of the manga since this is based off & set during that, specifically.

After her brother decided he hated her, after Natsuo learned the price that came with being better than everyone else without trying - well, eventually she learned to hone her isolation like a kendo blade, cracking it whip-quick at the pathetic world around her, and maybe never drawing blood, not with the damnably weak bamboo sword she'd been tossed for a weapon, but still always striking deep enough to leave a mark. Eventually she learned to hate and trample and destroy, until the ugly feelings rising in her chest exploded outward in a cascade of ruthless shrapnel, leaving behind only the smoking thrill of domination. Eventually, her soft, simpering peers, with their easy friendships and misplaced confidence, smiling so carelessly, so callously, all around her - eventually, they were like so many ants beneath her heel.

But before all that. Before Natsuo learned to be vicious. Before she learned to revel in her own power and aloneness, before she learned the violence the two could wreak when left to feed on each other like parasites. Before all that, there was Sanae.

Sanae was strong and fierce and _good_ , like nothing Natsuo had ever seen before. She fought to defend the weak and she fought to defeat the cruel and she always, always won. Maybe most importantly of all, though, she was _like_ Natsuo. She practiced and she worked hard, certainly, but Natsuo was half-convinced that that was all for show, to better inspire her hordes of admirers (or to keep them from hating her the way they hated Natsuo, maybe; Natsuo wouldn't know the difference). Sanae didn't _really_ need to work at it, though, it was so obvious. What she had was talent.

Just like Natsuo, she could watch and reproduce even the most complex kata on her first try. She could learn just by seeing, she could win just by participating; she fought like she breathed, all flowing intuition and reflexive in-out up-down motion. The harder she worked, the stronger she grew, but she was stronger than anyone Natsuo had ever met before she worked at all. Better yet, she was stronger than _Natsuo_.

Perhaps that was what drew her to Sanae, even more than the recognition. She could do anything she wanted, anything she tried, and she could do it better than Natsuo. The two of them improved in lockstep, practicing and sweating and sparring and gasping, both so much stronger than everyone around them, but always Sanae just that little bit better, that little bit more awe-inspiring. It was exhilarating, to know that Natsuo could grow and grow and grow the more she threw herself against Sanae's example, and there would always only be further to go, higher to climb. She would never catch up because Sanae's potential was as unlimited as her own, and there was nowhere for either of them to go but up.

Sanae was like Natsuo, and Sanae was better than Natsuo, and for so many years, she was all Natsuo wanted. All Natsuo needed.

Until one day, she wasn't.

The first time Natsuo beat Sanae, she assumed it was a mistake. Maybe Sanae had seen the bruise on her cheek when she came in that morning and assumed what Natsuo needed was pity, rather than a way to sweat out her problems and push her body to its limit. It was during a practice match, too, so it was always possible this was some new kind of example Sanae thought she was setting for her eager pupils. "Fail, and you can still get up and try again," or something useless and saccharine like that.

But afterwards, Natsuo asked her out to the park where the two of them would sometimes go to practice alone, where neither of them had to worry about holding back or keeping up appearances. Where the claws and fangs could come out and they'd always end up bruised and bloodied and soaked in sweat, and full up with the kind of boneless euphoria you could only get after a good, hard fight.

And there Natsuo beat her again.

She beat Sanae, she pounded her into the grass, and she barely had to break a sweat to do it. The worst thing was the look she caught passing across Sanae's face as she fell. Sanae looked... she looked... shattered. Not out of breath and invigorated, not frustrated but determined, but _broken_. Sanae would surely deny it if Natsuo asked - it was only a second before her expression snapped back into something approximating acceptance and its usual resolve - but Natsuo saw it and Natsuo knew. She couldn't miss it, after all: it was the same look all the other karate students wore after facing Natsuo in a fight. Later it would be the look she grew to expect and savor from her opponents in kendo, in judo, in softball; in boxing, basketball, volleyball; but right then, at that moment, from Sanae, her better, her senpai, her _kin_ , it was a betrayal.

And so Natsuo quit karate. She quit karate and she quit Sanae, and she never looked back. Sanae had never been like her after all, not really; nobody was, and that was just fine. Natsuo wasn't lonely, she was better, better than everyone else around her, and sometimes it might get boring but it certainly beat being soft and weak and breakable.

And then she discovered Mawatari, and MMA, and something new to throw herself against until she toppled whoever was at the top. Sanae reappeared before her suddenly - Sanae, who had cost her her brother, given her something better, and then taken it all away - but she proved little more than a stepping stone for Natsuo to vault over on her way to the top, and faded into memory once more.

But now Natsuo was at G-Girl, the tournament she'd scraped and fought with a delicious amount of effort to get into, and she was one match away from the infuriating, incredible girl who filled all her most vicious thoughts and dreams. One match away from getting to lay fists and feet on Mawatari Yuzuko, from her chance to try to wipe that tauntingly happy look off her face with her bare hands. Her mouth was practically watering with anticipation, she could hear the echoes of 'hentai' and 'weirdo' in a Kontani-san like voice rattling around her skull, and she didn't even _care_ , she was so excited.

The only thing standing between her and her chance at tantalizing, body-tingling victory was... Sanae.

Sanae, who wore an expression she'd never seen before. An expression which, if she wasn't so caught up with Mawatari, Natsuo might even find thrilling. As they took their stances, and an elated shiver crept up her spine, she wondered if she maybe already did.

Sanae's eyes were hard black flint, shadowed and furious, and they seemed to say: I hate you. I know you. I was you.

But most of all they said: Coward. _Coward_. You gave up on me so easily? You think knocking me down once took me out of the fight for good? I'll show you. I'll prove to you that people are stronger than that. I would have stood by you. I never gave up; you did.

Something inside Natsuo fluttered a bit, when she realized. She attributed it to the exhilaration, the promise of destroying Mawatari now so close she could taste it.

But beneath that, down deep somewhere, she wondered if it could possibly be true. If maybe she'd never shattered Sanae at all. If maybe - maybe she was the one who had broken and surrendered too easily, maybe she had made _herself_ alone -

Maybe Sanae had always been there, been waiting, been ready, as strong and superior and unbreakable as ever, and Natsuo just hadn't noticed.

...Well, there was only one way to find out.

Natsuo grinned savagely, and raised her gloves.


End file.
